About Jessica
Jessica Doogan built her legal foundation in the Midwest. She earned a B.A. in English from the University of Illinois–Springfield in 2011 and completed her J.D. at Capital University Law School in 2014. Those years set the stage for work that blends courtroom readiness with policy-level counsel.
Early in her career she joined the Ohio Civil Service Employees Association as Associate General Counsel in 2014. The position put her in the middle of public-employee issues and the day-to-day legal needs of a membership organization. She handled internal counsel tasks and supported collective-bargaining and compliance matters while learning the practical demands of representing an organized constituency.
Doogan moved from that in-house role into private practice. She is now an attorney at Barkan Meizlish, LLP. At the firm she has continued to work on matters that arise at the intersection of labor, employment and public-sector law. Her background with a labor association informs case assessment and strategy, especially where statutory rights and administrative procedures affect clients.
Her professional memberships reflect the areas of law she practices and the networks she maintains. She is active in the Columbus Bar Association and Women Lawyers of Franklin County. She also belongs to the Federal Bar Association and the AFL-CIO Lawyers Coordinating Committee. Since 2019 she has served on the board of the Ohio Associate Of Justic, bringing a practitioner’s perspective to that group’s work.
Colleagues describe Doogan as steady and practical in court and at the negotiating table. She moves between legal research, pleadings and client counseling in the same day. That mix can require rapid shifts in tone. She approaches each task with attention to process and to the limits that administrative and labor statutes impose.
Outside of client work she contributes to bar activities and professional committees. She has combined organizational experience and bar involvement to participate in programs and panels on employment and labor topics. She keeps an active calendar of litigation and advisory matters at Barkan Meizlish, LLP and continues to represent clients in labor and employment matters for public-sector and union organizations.
She currently practices at Barkan Meizlish, LLP, focusing on labor and employment matters for public-sector and union clients.
